eBay Sellers Can No Longer Use PayPal Under New Terms (bbc.com) 110
New terms of use for eBay have come into effect which mean the online auction house will now pay sellers directly rather than through PayPal. The BBC reports: PayPal was acquired by eBay in its early days in 2002, and the two firms have worked in partnership ever since. The changes mean that while eBay buyers can still pay with PayPal, sellers will be paid straight into their bank accounts. But some sellers have threatened to stop using the service over the move.
EBay's forums have several posts from sellers who say they are reluctant to use the new system and give eBay direct debit access to their personal bank accounts. But the new terms, effective from 1 June, say the new "managed payments" system is compulsory, and the company has the power to limit or remove listings from sellers who refuse to use it. The company says the new system is simpler, convenient, and gives buyers more payment options - and the rollout will be gradual. It marks a significant change in an almost two-decade partnership with PayPal, which split from eBay in 2015.
EBay's forums have several posts from sellers who say they are reluctant to use the new system and give eBay direct debit access to their personal bank accounts. But the new terms, effective from 1 June, say the new "managed payments" system is compulsory, and the company has the power to limit or remove listings from sellers who refuse to use it. The company says the new system is simpler, convenient, and gives buyers more payment options - and the rollout will be gradual. It marks a significant change in an almost two-decade partnership with PayPal, which split from eBay in 2015.
Open a separate bank account (Score:5, Insightful)
Turns out banks don't typically restrict their customers to a single account. If you're worried about eBay having access to your account, open a new one, set eBay to use that, and move out any money they put in there. Keep only the minimum necessary to keep the account open.
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yes yes, very clever young man; but its bank accounts all the way down!
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Indeed, a common term is having a "sweep" account that handles income. The problem is, extra bank... extra fees... extra reconciliation... extra stuff just so they can keep an arms length from others, something they believe they already have with their Paypal account.
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Well they no longer have the PayPal option. They can piss into the wind until they get dropped from eBay or find a solution to their problem they can live with.
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Extra? There's nothing extra beyond the usual bookkeeping a person is suppose to do when handling money. Some people have other banks so they can have greater FDIC protection.
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I don't know about you, but I have no fees to transfer money between my accounts. Either my personal one or the one for my S corp.
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If the accounts are in the same bank, sure.
If the accounts are in separate banks, as the kind of people who might be inclined to be paranoid about this kind of change at ebay are liable to prefer, there's usually a fee.
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If the accounts are in the same bank, sure.
If the accounts are in separate banks, as the kind of people who might be inclined to be paranoid about this kind of change at ebay are liable to prefer, there's usually a fee.
I’ve literally never encountered a transfer fee between banks across the half-dozen banks I’ve had checking or savings accounts with in the last decade or so. Not saying they don’t exist, but if you have one I’d suggest you’re not at a good bank. I transfer money between banks all the time, and the only headache I have to deal with is the wait time.
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Are you an American? Because there are transfer fees and crappy delays when moving money between different banks here in the good, old, U.S. of A.
Zelle is an option, but interbank transfers carry fees that vary depending on how fast you want your money moved. For example, Bank of America:
Send money to almost anyone in the U.S. from your eligible personal checking, savings, money market, SafeBalance Banking or your line of credit account to their account using an account number. Money sent to other Bank of America customers using an account number is immediate and you can send up to $1,000 during any 24-hour period or $2,500 within a rolling 7-day period (limits may be higher for Small Business, Private or Wealth Management Banking customers). You can also use an account number to transfer money to accounts of others at other U.S. banks. Transfer limits vary and are available in 3 delivery speeds: same business day using a wire, next business day or 3 business days, all for a fee.
Welcome to the 19th Century banking regime!
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Bank in the USA is genuinely crazy. Here in the UK it basically free. There is a daily limit I believe but I recently did an online transfer for 18k GBP and didn't pay a single penny, and it was there within two hours.
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Right... because any exception clearly means that any generalization must be wrong, even when the generalization makes no claim of somehow being universal.
What I said was:
Given that the USA is almost 5 times the size of the UK in population, I think that my statement still stands.
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Basically the same here in the US for me. There are some daily limits (usually $10,000), and there’s a (very reasonable) federal mandate regarding how many times in a month that you can pull money from a savings account, but otherwise I never think about it. I’ll routinely move thousands of dollars back and forth between our accounts. Within a bank it’s instant. Between banks it takes a few days to clear the ACH (automated clearing house), but if you initiate the transfer as a pull, not a
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Are you an American?
Yes, I am. I used to bank with BofA, but left because they kept adding more and more fees. Interbank transfer fees weren’t yet a thing with them at the time I closed my account.
But that gets at exactly what I was saying: BofA is a terrible bank, so it comes as no surprise that they have those fees now. It’s reasons like those why I left them years ago and why you should too if you’re still with them. You can find savings accounts with interest rates literally 100x better, with the same FDI
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There are numerous banks that offer free checking. If they for some ridiculous reason charge a fee for an ACH transfer, write yourself a check from one account and deposit it in the other.
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On a personal level it is slightly harder to manage, but if you are running a business it is simply good policy. Moreover, for any small business owners out there with employees, you should ideally have a payment account, a payables account, a separate account just for payroll, and a “treasury” account for savings at a minimum. It makes auditing things so much easier.
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in Australia - all the banks have accounts that have zero fee's if you deposit like $2000 a month.
haven't had a fee in about 23 years
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Indeed, a common term is having a "sweep" account that handles income. The problem is, extra bank... extra fees... extra reconciliation... extra stuff just so they can keep an arms length from others, something they believe they already have with their Paypal account.
There are banks that do not require a minimum balance and charge no fees. I've been using Ally Bank (the old GMAC) for over 20 years and have, literally, never given them a dime for my checking and/or savings account. I honestly have no idea how they stay in business. They even refund me the fees that ATMs charge for dispensing cash.
Point is, anyone who is paying a bank fees hasn't bothered to do some research. There are fee-less banks out there
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I honestly have no idea how they stay in business.
What do you think they do with your money? Convert it into paper money and store it in a big vault?
Banks make money by investing some of it, lending some of it, etc. The federal government limits how much a bank can lend and home much must be kept in reserve. Lending Limits [investopedia.com]
Where do you think the money for car loans comes from? That is the bank using your money to lend to other people. The loans are paid back with interest and the bank uses that to run itself and pay a small percentage to you as in
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I honestly have no idea how they stay in business.
What do you think they do with your money? Convert it into paper money and store it in a big vault? Banks make money by investing some of it, lending some of it, etc. The federal government limits how much a bank can lend and home much must be kept in reserve. Lending Limits [investopedia.com]
WTF? I know how banks work, but you just made a lot of effing assumptions. You ASSUMED I keep some reasonable amount of money in the bank. I don't. I keep a small amount in THAT bank. Not enough for them to make much money off of loaning it out. I have another bank where I put away the large sums.
At any given time Ally probably has no more than $1,000 of my money. It's my "working accounts".
You can still get that account overdrawn (Score:2)
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If in the U.S.: credit union.
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The only problem is that most Credit Unions I've spoken with only allow accounts for personal use, not business. A little ebay selling on the side probably wouldn't pose a problem, but if you're running enough money through there to live on, they might close the account or cancel your membership outright.
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Having a separate bank account doesn't actually help though. You just end up with a bank account with negative balance, being charged overdraft fees until you settle it.
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It's even possible to downgrade a full-service account to this level - in fact it's not uncommon if a customer has demonstrated poor financial sense.
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I can tell you from experience that connecting any bank account to an institution that doesn't have the same financial responsibilities as your bank does is a huge mistake. Several years ago I found this out with Paypal who locked up a lot of MY money due to some of the policies. I won't be selling anything on Ebay so long as this particular requirement is in effect because it's one thing for them to affect my (now well-distanced from my bank) Paypal account but for them to be able to get me in trouble with
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That doesn't work. Also ask Australia, they've been doing it this way forever.
The problem isn't that you're giving access to eBay, the problem is that the US checking system gives everyone two-way access to your bank account when you do.
Opening additional accounts at a bank doesn't save you either, you just end up with a stack of NSF charges and them pulling the money out of any other account at the bank to collect the damages. If you want to ensure eBay can't pull a PayPal and charge you for things you hav
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Just my thought. Makes for some management effort, but not a lot and usually does not cost a lot either.
This may kill PayPal (Score:2)
One could essentially "live inside" Ebay and trade goods back and forth via a PayPay account. Now if it must go to and from an old-fashioned bank, the benefit and ease of "living inside" Ebay will fade. Idontgeddit
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It seems like you get it- you used to be able to not use a bank. Now you have to use a bank. That benefits banks, so it happened. What's confusing?
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but what if you've already transferred the payment to another account?
if you get a payment with Paypal, Paypal puts a hold on that transfer for several days, during which time if they get a chargeback they are guaranteed to still have your money to return. Banks do the same thing when a check is deposited. By law, they have to let you withdraw half of it I think. (Paypal isn't bound by that?) So in theory eBay could be on the hook (in the short term anyway) for at least half? So I don't see why switching fr
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but what if you've already transferred the payment to another account?
Then the account eBay debited gets a negative balance, and you rack up overdraft fees until you settle it with your bank.
I'm confused (Score:2)
Why would ebay need direct debit to your account as a seller? Direct credit, sure, but why direct debit? Direct debit as a buyer, sure, but why as a seller?
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Forced refunds. They happen. Same as with PayPal.
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Ebay seller here. They did this so they can charge an extra 2.5% on sales. Because we no longer have Paypal fees which are similar. So they sellers pay the same per transaction, but ebay gets the money now, not paypal.
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Makes a lot of sense.
First Bank of Paypal (Score:2)
Re:First Bank of Paypal (Score:5, Informative)
Right now PayPal is legally not a bank. This actually allows them to do all kinds of things that would be illegal for a bank to do. Once they become a bank, even if they buy one, they'll suddenly be regulated. They do not want that. They do a ton of things with freezing of accounts that is not legal for a bank to do.
Re:First Bank of Paypal (Score:4, Informative)
Right now PayPal is legally not a bank.
It depends... it definitely is a bank in Europe. The PayPal Europe entity is fully licensed as a bank in Luxembourg and has been since 2008. This license covers all their activities in Europe and the United Kingdom (until the end of the Brexit grace period, where they will need a separate license in the UK).
For the US, it is actually way more complicated. Due to the patchwork of state-level regulations, they would actually need to apply for 50+ separate licenses which isn't exactly easy or economical. They are already overseen by the banking regulator in 20+ states.
They do a ton of things with freezing of accounts that is not legal for a bank to do.
As a bank, PayPal Europe falls under the AML and CFT regulations. This means they do have a legal obligation to sneaky freeze your account for many reasons. Nobody outside the "regulatory compliance" team will know the reason for the freeze, and they can't share that information for legal reasons ("tipping off" is a serious offence, with penalties for the entity and the employee).
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Everyone can become a bank in Lixemburg though.
Having worked on obtaining various licenses in Luxembourg and other places, I'd like to point out things have changed in the last decades. From first hand experience, getting FCA licensed in the UK is a literal walk in the park compared to Luxembourg... at no point in the process were we asked to demonstrate any substance in the UK (outside a managing director) or how the entity would be financially viable. The lowest level of financial license in Luxembourg (Payment Institution) requires answering question
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Right now PayPal is legally not a bank.
It depends... it definitely is a bank in Europe. The PayPal Europe entity is fully licensed as a bank in Luxembourg and has been since 2008. This license covers all their activities in Europe and the United Kingdom (until the end of the Brexit grace period, where they will need a separate license in the UK).
They could allow US citizens/residents to open an account but then they become open to a lot of US rules so I doubt they would do that.
For the US, it is actually way more complicated. Due to the patchwork of state-level regulations, they would actually need to apply for 50+ separate licenses which isn't exactly easy or economical. They are already overseen by the banking regulator in 20+ states.
I would think it would be simpler to simply buy a bank and run it as a separate, wholly owned entity. There are already online banks, for example, that could fill the bill.
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They could allow US citizens/residents to open an account but then they become open to a lot of US rules so I doubt they would do that.
That would indeed open up a complex can of worms. Those companies tend to clearly define who is a customer of a regulated entity in order to avoid the regulatory creep that would be caused by such a decision.
I would think it would be simpler to simply buy a bank and run it as a separate, wholly owned entity. There are already online banks, for example, that could fill the bill.
Paypal is actually doing something close to that, having acquired a few companies in the online banking segment... while claiming they're not a bank and do not wish to be one. From the interviews I have read, and discussions with former PP execs, they may just be playing a definition game on "not a bank
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Complainers are morons, IMO ... (Score:5, Informative)
I'm a *long* time eBay seller (as well as buyer). I don't do large volumes or anything, but I've sold the random item I wanted to clear out of the house or the computer product I received from someone else in trade for computer services, since at least 2001.
The eBay / PayPal merger was one of the most questionable acts of collusion I can think of with paid web sites! Before that, sellers had options to use one of a number of available payment services, including one that handled electronic checks withdrawn from people's checking accounts. Once eBay acquired PayPal, they made it the ONLY payment option. And that led to sellers having to pay not only eBay's listing and percentage of final sale fees but percentages of the final transaction fees that PayPal took out as the "processor".
The concern that "eBay will have direct access to your checking account" by letting them direct deposit your funds is a non-issue, to the extent that via PayPal -- this was ALWAYS the case. eBay wouldn't let you do any substantial amount of sales on the platform without your PayPal account being linked to a valid account or accounts. If you didn't provide PayPal with your checking account info, you'd have to provide them with debit or credit card info at the very least. Any time there was a dispute over a sale or any time you owed eBay some fees, they'd just charge it to your PayPal account, which meant it came right out of one of the linked accounts as soon as any balance already in it was depleted.
And let me tell you... there are few things more difficult than successfully challenging one of those PayPal withdrawals from your bank account! You *might* have more success with a chargeback request to your credit card? But doing that would immediately get your eBay account suspended.
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Paypal account did not/does not need to be linked to a bank account (they like that and will push you in that direction, but they can't force you). Mine has never been. It does have a few credit cards saved for payments, but paypal can't pull balance out of those.
As mentioned below, there is no "overdraft" with paypal. With a bank account OTOH - there is. Check your bank's NSF fee schedule.
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The eBay / PayPal merger was one of the most questionable acts of collusion
You can't collude with yourself. There's absolutely nothing out of the ordinary about a company buying another in part of their supply chain and then forcing the use of it exclusively. It's shitty for users, but not even remotely questionable nor it is collusion. Collusion would be Paypal being a separate entity that as part of their contractual negotiation with ebay precluded the use of any other payment method.
The concern that "eBay will have direct access to your checking account" by letting them direct deposit your funds is a non-issue
Yeah I honestly don't get it. There are few companies in finance shadier than Paypal. Not dealin
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All I'm really interested in is if the new dispute resolution is any good. PayPal, for all its faults, was usually tilted in favour of the buyer.
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Once eBay acquired PayPal, they made it the ONLY payment option.
At least lose the fucking caps; I often bid on local eBay auctions, pick up in person and pay cash.
re: in person pickups (Score:2)
Ok, that's true. You could always list an eBay auction item with the option for a buyer to do local pickup. But in about 20 years of listing items on eBay, I've never once had that actually happen. I'd say you're a relatively rare exception if you actually use eBay only to find local listings you can pick up in person.
The primary reason eBay is useful to a seller is the wide (even potentially global) reach.
Liars, too. (Score:2)
I'm also in nearly the same boat. I've been using it very occasionally since the 1990s to get rid of junk, but never a big seller. Back when they started forcing Paypal down the users' throats, I still had text in my listing to the effect of "personal checks/money orders also accepted" or some such. One day they took down my listing and told me I was violating their terms. In that e-mail, they also had the gall to have some revisionist crap about how "eBay created Paypal to make eBay safe for buyers" or
PayPal sucks anyhow! (Score:2)
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The last time I used PayPal when selling something... the buyer screwed me, and PayPal ALSO screwed me by giving the seller a refund.
You got a refund. What's the problem?
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... the buyer screwed me, and PayPal ALSO screwed me by giving the seller a refund.
What makes you think Ebay would not do the same, with or without PP? Ebay are strongly pre-disposed to buyers.
This probably wont fly in Australia (Score:2)
If eBay tries to limit the payment options for buyers and sellers in Australia then that's likely to get them in trouble with the ACCC I suspect.
Its no different to a shopping centre owner telling shopping centres that they have to only use Visa for payment and can't accept MasterCard or other card types.
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The way I understand it, eBay is inserting itself as a man in the middle and collecting payments from buyers (who pay via whatever method) and giving that money to sellers via a deposit into their bank accounts.
I am not a lawyer or a consumer law expert but it may not be legal for eBay to insert itself as a middleman in what is otherwise a transaction between 2 people who are just using eBay as a platform.
And if eBay is insisting that sellers can only accept payment this way (i.e. buyer uses one of the paym
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eBay is like a consignment store. When something is sold in a consignment store you don't pay the end seller directly you pay the store owner who then pays the end seller. The only real difference here is that the consignment store (eBay) doesn't take physical possession of the item being sold while looking to find someone to by the item. They just use a digital representation (i.e. photos of the item) to show the buyer what they are purchasing.
Without eBay acting as a middleman the buyer and seller would n
Separate account won't help (Score:3)
The issue here is that ebay by contract let themselves deposit and *withdraw* money from seller's bank accounts.
So, even if you keep a separate, essentially empty, account solely to sell things on ebay - ebay can (as a result of a buyer's claim/dispute/billing error/bits flipped due to cosmic rays) withdraw an arbitrary sum of money from that account. Now, if that sum is not actually available, you will be hit with insufficient fund fees by your bank, lose access to said account, will still be on the hook for the entire amount to ebay, and possibly take a hit to your credit report.
If you ever had to deal with ebay as a seller - you know there will be no help, and you will be SOL.
Now, with paypal, this was not the case simply because paypal is not a bank (and does not have a concept of overdraft, insufficient funds or anything similar). My paypal was not funded with anything other than ebay sales money, which stayed there and were used from time to time as needed.
Not a big loss to me, as I was not selling much (and lately the extensive skew in favor of buyers along with fees made selling on ebay an unprofitable hassle). As a buyer, I still like ebay very much and plan to continue using them.
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They can go their hardest. Where I live non-recurring direct debit withdrawals need to be pre-announced in advance giving you ample opportunity to wait out a weekend or two and call the bank and say no.
The problem here is your banking laws that prevent you recourse for this kind of transaction. It's the reason why Americans use credit cards and paypal while Europeans and much of the rest of the world scratch their heads wondering what all'y'all are doing over there.
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My bank in .au simply wont allow transactions that overdraw the account, I just use a second account that is also a Visa debit, and keep it to a couple of dollars balance.
I can transfer from my main account instantly.
Craigslist (Score:1)
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The process..... (Score:2)
So I get an Email that I'm supposed to join the new system. I can just click on this link (not to ebay.com) ....
Well... NO! I won't click on a link from an E-mail and then enter my financial details.
So I send off a customer service request, how to find the sign me up from my account.
So they send me a link... that doesn't work. So I reply: "the link doesn't work".
In the meanwhile, using hints from that link I manage to find the "sign up here" page. So I sign up.
So then I get another answer from customer serv
Isn't this a good thing? (Score:2)
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Next question
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Money took 3 days to reach my bank account, most of that time Ebay were sitting on it. Buyer was getting irate because I was not posting the item until I saw the money.
With PayPal the money could be seen in my PP account the moment the buyer paid, so I could post the item without delay.
The new plan doesn't all suck (Score:2)
They'll take fees out of the payment for each transaction and credit you directly for the remainder, making it easier to figure out how much money you made (always less than you expected, the nature of the beast).
Previously, they'd credit Paypal with the whole payment, then bill you for the postage, then bill you for the fees at the end of the month. Made accounting tough. Yeah, it's the same numbers in the end, but when you're splitting the proceeds of an estate, it gets hard to keep track.
However, the ne
Sweep accounts (Score:2)
This would be a good reason to set up a dedicated account with the bank that's deposit-only and set to sweep all deposits over into a separate account every day. Then if eBay tries to debit the account for any reason it'll fail. You may need to talk to the side of the bank that handles merchants rather than consumers.
New Method is Slooooow (Score:2)
In the old system, the buyers money would appear in my PayPal account the instant that they paid, so I would post the item straight away.
This fuck-up is Ebay's idea of "streamlining" the process (their word). They
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I sold an item on May 17th and received the money in my account on the 18th. This is with the new system.
I sold an item yesterday (June 1st) and shipped it today. Your e-mail prompted me to dig thru the details and HOLY FUCK THEY TAKE A 14.55% "VALUE" FEE!
Final Value FeeVariable percentage  Books & Magazines category -$39.01
Rate for $0.00 - $7,500.00 -- 14.55%
I'm glad I was just unloading a couple of books, because HOLY SHIT I GOT SCREWED! I knew they took a cut, but from now on everything just goes to Goodwill or a garage sale. The hell with E-Bay!
Ebay is a sh*tshow (Score:2)
Ebay morphed from an auction-only site where someone could sell something to an honest collector into a den of thieves looking for a smokin' deal on something so they can turn around and resell it. I pretty much stopped selling stuff because of this. The buyers don't really want the product. They're looking for a sucker willing to sell something cheap then bitch that it isn't in factory-shrink-wrap-new condition.
No good (Score:1)
So to the comments in the thread where it's not a big deal, or people will save money.. there's really no positive for sellers, unless they're a business who isn't really going to care.
Sellers do not get paid immediately; funds go into your eBay account, and may be withdrawn, but will take days (at best). I believe they may still be used within eBay, but they are not immediately available for use in the real world, apart from using the funds to ship the product. Want cash in-hand before shipping? You'll und
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How is that diff from the rest of the web: cheapo "volume engines" powered by half-ass-AI bots who won't let you talk to a human.
Hmm, has there ever been a Trek episode where the Captain wanted to discuss an urgent matter with a planet's leaders, but bots kept getting in the way and misdirecting them in circles?
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That's my first take on it. Though I do wish eBay rolled out this new option and let it sit for a while to see which way people preferred. Forced moves always piss off users, even if they're done for the right reasons. This is no different.
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Why is it the Slashdot "lameness filters" won't let me make simple ASCII-art tech diagrams, but this moron manages to get giant swastikas through? Reminds me of the Airport metal detector scene. [youtube.com]
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Why is slashdot slashcode closed source?
Why don't they take fixes from soylent?
Why is UTF-8 still broken?
Noone with the keys has skills or cares. All three are needed.
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Or mods can give stuff like that a SPAM tag, and the rest of us can filter on that. Keeps the filtering simple.
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Or mods can give stuff like that a SPAM tag, and the rest of us can filter on that. Keeps the filtering simple.
you mean like the current troll tag so people can read at 1+? well, your lucky day: wish granted. ;-)
still no use for those mature enough to do their own filtering and read at -1, but hey, i really have no trouble with troll posts. swastika man might spam at his heart's content, i don't really mind. they're an inevitable part of human society and are actually everywhere. in fact, surfing the net is an exercise in mental filtering, most of what gets posted regardless of format or medium is some form of bulls
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Three a's is all anyone will ever need. -Gill Bates